Bol locks horns with online CD sellers

Takes on the myriad of other online retailers

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Bol.com, the online bookshop launched by Bertelsmann AG earlier this year, will add to the growing competition for CDs over the Web by launching its own service at the end of the month. No fancy title, but Bol will have over 500,000 titles to choose from, 50 per cent of which, it says, will have 30-second audio clips for the try-before-you-buy experience. The music site will also keep to the tradition of under-cutting the high street and will offer the top 20 albums for £9.99. It will also include the usual news, reviews and interviews. Bol was launched in March as a competitor to the all-powerful Amazon, claiming an inventory of every UK book in print. The music site is the next step in the company's plans to become a major player in the world of ecommerce. ®